


The Melting Ice Man

by Roshwen



Series: In Which... [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Fitting nicknames, Gen, Iceman&Virgin, Nightmares, Prompt fill 1 of 10
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-10
Updated: 2012-12-10
Packaged: 2017-11-20 19:55:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/589079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roshwen/pseuds/Roshwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>By day, he is the Ice Man. By night, he melts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Melting Ice Man

**Author's Note:**

> To be honest, this prompt wasn't mine but it was calling out to me. It is part of a list, and I'm planning on filling the entire thing though I don't have a clue how or when. Anyway, this was: In which Mycroft cries.
> 
> Have fun, and comments are very much appreciated!

**The melting Ice Man**

By day, he is the Ice Man. Cool as a cucumber, with the shark-like smile and impeccable suit that will never shout it out but do politely whisper _Control_. _Power_. He stands tall and self-assured in his bespoke leather shoes, making anyone else in turn feel small, unimportant, weak. That is what he does, that is what his job is all about: intimidate people into doing what you need them to do. He never gets involved, never gets attached, never gets close. He remains distant. Cold. No sentiment allowed, for it will serve only to distract and destruct.

He only allows himself the small ones -the flicker of a smile, a dissapproving glare, an exasperated sigh- when they are of use to him. After all, he won’t let himself be distracted, but if someone else will, by all means, go ahead. Be his guest. He has no use for his emotions, but all the more for those in other people. He is a puppet player, pulling each string precisely when he means to, in order to make them dance.

That is during the day. During the night, the Ice Man melts.

Not every night, fortunately. Most nights he sleeps the sleep of the just, and he is as surprised as anyone else would be, if they ever found out. Some nights, however, are different. They are bad. During these nights, the strings are snatched out of his puppet master hand and taken over by someone else, someone buried dark and deep and far away, hidden behind lock and key. But sometimes, the door peeps open, and the horror that is down there comes out.

To put it bluntly: the British Government has nightmares. Not your normal kind of nightmares, mind you. A normal nightmare is just a very unpleasant dream that makes no sense at all. Everyone has been chased by a giant cauliflower or been forced to eat dark blue goo at least once in their lifes, dreams that come and go and are easily laughed away in the morning. No, these are the other kind of nightmares, the realistic ones that dig into your subconcious, pushing all the right buttons and pulling all the right levers until there is nothing left but terror and tears.

The dreams that say:

You are alone.

Or: No one loves you.

Or: He is dead.

Or: You will die.

Or: Remember that accident/war/fire you were in?

The dream of the Ice Man says no such thing. There is only one thing that can melt him, reduce him to tears, real, genuine tears and it’s this.

What Mycroft Holmes sees during those long, dreadful nights are his father, his mother and his little brother saying: _You were not there when needed you. We asked you to help us. You were my son, my brother and you should have come, should have helped, but you left us. You abandoned us. We were on our own, struggling to get through all alone and we couldn’t do it because_ you were not there _. You were not there_.

It goes on and on, all night long, until he wakes, wet with sweat and tears, to the sound of his own sobbing.

The most terrifying part of this? It is all completely true. He never cared much about his father’s wish that he take over the family business. It broke the man to see the business he poured his heart and soul into taken over by a nameless, faceless multinational and made into the exact copy of all their other branches. Mycroft didn’t care, to busy getting into the good books of some very influential people.

He left his mother and Sherlock to cope on their own when his father died. His mother nearly succumbed under the double pressure of her own grief and her stubborn and wilful son, who refused to show any sign off distress or pain, opting for complete silence instead. This time, Mycroft was to busy climbing the ranks behind the scenes of Downing Street, well on his way to being a master puppet player.

He set a criminal mastermind loose after his brother, forcing him to burn all his ships behind him and literally fall into disgrace. A computer key code, the ultimate weapon proved more important than Sherlock’s safety, as a certain army doctor subtly pointed out. An army doctor who has come closer to his brother’s barely-existing heart than he ever has.

So, the British Government never fights his dreams. Never takes any sleeping pills or other medicine, because the nightmares have every right to be there. The agony they bring is justified and well-deserved, and therefore he submits himself to them willingly, suffering all the punishment he knows he deserves.

But only during the night. By day, he will remain cold and distant.

Like an Ice Man ought to be.


End file.
